To the Ends of the Earth' Trailer

U.S. Forest Service set to decide on fracking in George Washington National Forest

George Washington National Forest is more than just one of the largest expanses of pristine land in the East. It’s the cradle of the Shenandoah, James and Potomac rivers.

By the end of the month, the U.S. Forest Service is expected to decide whether to ban or allow the controversial method of drilling called hydraulic fracturing under the forest’s new, 15-year management plan.

LINK (via:The Washington Post)

Frackalypse

Gas fracking companies revealed in a private PR conference that they're using military psychological warfare tactics (Psyops) on U.S. soil, and described citizens concerned about fracking's threat to health, water and the climate as "an insurgency."

Few look at the entire life cycle of fracking from cradle to grave

Until recently, one of the most underlooked facets of the industry was the “cradle” portion of the shale gas lifecycle: frac-sand mining in the hills of northwestern Wisconsin and bordering eastern Minnesota, areas now serving as the epicenter of the frac-sand mining world.

(via: Ecowatch)

Get the Shell out of the Sacred Headwaters

The moratorium on gas drilling in Sacred Headwaters is set to expire in seven months. At Shell’s recent annual shareholder meeting, the company made clear that it has no plans to withdraw its operations to drill frack for gas in BC’s Sacred Headwaters.

LINK (via: Forest Ethics)

The same effort put forth by the fly trade and others to fight the Pebble Mine should be duplicated to protect the Sacred Headwaters. The threat to the Sacred Headwaters and the Great Bear Rain Forest are as egregious as Pebble is to Bristol Bay. The Sacred Headwaters are the birthplace of the Skeena, Nass, and Stikine Rivers, some of the wildest salmon and steelhead rivers remaining in North America.

EPA: 'Fracking' likely polluted town's water

A controversial method of drilling for oil and natural gas appears to be the cause of groundwater pollution in a central Wyoming town, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Thursday.

The EPA last month said it had found compounds associated with chemicals used in the drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in the groundwater beneath Pavillion. Many residents say their well water has reeked of chemicals since the drilling began there and first complained to the EPA in 2008.

But until Thursday, the EPA said it could not speculate on where the contaminants came from.

In the draft report (.pdf) released Thursday, the EPA said that "the explanation best fitting the data ... is that constituents associated with hydraulic fracturing have been released into the Wind River drinking water aquifer."

LINK (Via: MSNBC)

Crackpot Senator James Inhofe, the senior Republican on the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, said this is more evidence of the Obama administration agenda to shut down natural gas production and blasted the report as political science.

Hey Senator, regardless of your opinion on the report, how about a little sympathy for the people of Pavillion? In 2009 the EPA advised Pavillion residents not to drink their water and to ventilate their homes when they showered or washed dishes.

Breath deep, the fog you see obscuring this Pavillion home is haze from fracking fluids vaporized in the drilling process.

Oh, about that administration agenda of shutting down oil and gas drilling.

Drilling in this country is at its highest level since 1987. Under Obama, and much to the detriment of the environment, gas drilling in the US has quadrupled.